Both hand and electric or pneumatic tool drivers are well known. Although twist drills are the most common tools on such drivers, the tools may also comprise screwdrivers, nut drivers, burrs, mounted grinding stones, and other cutting or abrading tools. Since the tool shanks may be of varying diameter or of polygonal cross section, the device is usually provided with a chuck adjustable over a relatively wide range. The chuck may be attached to the driver by a threaded or tapered bore.
A variety of chucks have been developed in the art. In an oblique jawed chuck, a chuck body includes three passageways disposed approximately 120° apart from each other. The passageways are configured so that their center lines meet at a point along the chuck axis forward of the chuck. The passageways contain three jaws that are movable in the passageways to grip a cylindrical or polygonal tool shank displaced approximately along the chuck center axis. The chuck includes a nut that rotates about the chuck center and that engages threads on the jaws so that rotation of the nut moves the jaws in either direction within the passageways. The body is attached onto the driveshaft of a driver and is configured so that rotation of the body in one direction with respect to the nut forces the jaws into gripping relationship with the tool shank, while rotation in the opposite direction releases the gripping relationship. The chuck may be keyless if it is rotated by hand. Examples of such chucks are disclosed in U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,125,673, 5,193,824, 7,722,054, and 8,616,561, commonly assigned to the present assignee and the entire disclosures of each of which are incorporated by reference herein for all purposes. Various configurations of keyless chucks are known in the art and are desirable for a variety of applications.
The present disclosure recognizes and addresses the foregoing considerations, and others, of prior art constructions and methods.